


How Lucky These Days Are

by SublimeDiscordance



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Kaiju, Dogs, Fluff, M/M, Pacific Rim Secret Santa 2014, actual puppy dog raleigh becket, holiday fluff, pacific rim secret santa 2014 - tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-24
Updated: 2014-12-24
Packaged: 2018-03-03 04:25:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2837888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SublimeDiscordance/pseuds/SublimeDiscordance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Raleigh keeps bringing stray pets home. Herc has just stopped objecting at this point. Sort of.</p>
            </blockquote>





	How Lucky These Days Are

**Author's Note:**

> For [spoopydanchoo](http://spoopydanchoo.tumblr.com/)'s pacific rim secret santa prompt requesting Herculeigh (or Chaleigh) fluff. I went with Herculeigh. Because it's been a while since I've written them. And I wanted to. And because this idea just...popped into my head and I wanted to write it. 
> 
> Apologies for how short ~~and bad~~ this is. My life has been...busy...as of late. 
> 
> Title from Ingrid Michaelson's "Live It With Love"

“No.”

“But Herc—”

“No, Rals, and that’s final.”

“Herc, _please_ —”

“ _Raleigh_ …”

“C’mon, what was I supposed to do? Let him freeze to death?”

 “Rals, you…”

Herc has to pinch the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes for a moment before letting them come to rest on his boyfriend. _Husband_ , his mind helpfully reminds him, the fresh twinkle of the band on Raleigh’s finger a reminder that, oh right, they _had_ finally gotten that done last month. The way they’d been talking about for close to four years. That, however, has nothing to do with the subject of their current argument. Herc’s hand moves from the bridge of his nose to massaging at his forehead.

A glance over at Raleigh tells him that he’s still sitting amidst a veritable pile of animals, most of them dogs. Their one cat jumps off the back of the couch down to beside Raleigh’s lap, the ocicat sniffing at the shivering, red-brown bundle there and giving a soft, meow.

“See?” Herc doesn’t have to be looking at him to know that Raleigh’s grinning like a loon. “Mako likes him. Yancy, too,” he adds as their golden puppy—their first rescue—snuffles lightly at the dachshund in Raleigh’s arms and wags his tail a few times. The smaller dog looks at the retriever, then around at the other dogs assembled around them, before casting a plaintive look over in Herc’s direction. God damn it.

“That’s great Rals, but it doesn’t help if we can’t keep ‘im. We’ve gotta be over a legal limit or something, here—”

“Seven.” Raleigh’s not looking at him any more, is instead running his fingers down the back of the small dog in his arms. “The limit’s seven. And he’d put us right at it.”

Mako steps over the puppy and higher up Raleigh’s lap before settling. Bats at Sasha’s nose when the pit tries to sniff at their new arrival, sending her scampering back to her brother with a soft whine. Herc’s headache settles oh-so-nicely behind his eyes. He’s gonna have to go out on goddamn Christmas Eve to buy new shit for this dog, isn’t he? God _damn_ it. He heaves a sigh before dropping his hand from his face.

“You’re responsible for him.”

“I already take care of all the others—”

“Which means if he starts crying at fucking two in the morning, _you’re_ the one getting your arse out of bed.”

“I already—”

“And if he shits on the carpet, you’re cleaning it up.”

“ _Herc_ —”

“I mean it, Rals, I’m—”

“Herc.” Maybe it’s the softness in his husband’s tone, but Herc finds his mouth shutting with a clack of teeth. Raleigh stands, still carrying their new dog ( _god damn it_ ), and pads softly over to him. The other animals crowd after him, though their bulldog, Mack (“After the truck, Herc! C’mon, it’s _cute_!”), waddles past them and barrels into Herc’s calves, all fifty pounds of him nearly bringing Herc to his knees. Raleigh steps around Mack until he’s in Herc’s space, presses his head forward until their foreheads are touching.

“I know, okay. Thank you. For saying yes.”

Herc wants to be upset. Wants to yell at Raleigh for effectively ambushing him with yet _another_ dog. But he finds himself looking down into those big, brown eyes, practically pleading with him, and something in his heart snaps, warmth flooding him. He reaches up a hand to rest on the little dog’s head, and a long snout pushes at him until a warm tongue is running over his palm. Raleigh chuckles, warm breath striking Herc’s cheek and smelling of cinnamon—probably been sampling the cider again, even though the brat _knows_ it’s for the party tommorrow—before there’s a warm set of lips following.

“See? You like him too.”

Herc scratches the dog behind the ears, getting a few more licks for his trouble.

“I guess he’s not all bad. You thought of a name yet?”

Another chuckle, then, “Chuck.”

Herc blinks. Blinks again. Moves back a step. Mack follows him, and it’s a momentary struggle not to lose his balance again.

“No.”

“Oh come _on_ , Yancy likes him so much, which is _so_ fitting, and—”

“Raleigh, you are _not_ naming a bloody _weiner dog_ after my son.”

Raleigh leans down, sets the little dog beside his bare foot. Yancy immediately sniffs at him, tail wagging more forcefully.

“You didn’t object when I named one after my brother.”

“Yeah, well, your brother _is_ a fucking golden retriever, so it fit. Plus he’s _your_ brother and—”

“Or when I named one after your best friend.”

“Stacker _suggested_ it. Mind you, he was drunk, but it was still his—”

“Or after your squadmates.”

“...Raleigh, they weren’t my bloody _son_.”

“Besides,” Raleigh speaks as if Herc had remained silent, “after what Chuck and Yancy pulled last Thanksgiving, I think having a ‘weiner dog’,” Herc can practically _hear_ the quotation marks, “named after Chuck is pretty fair.”

And...alright, he can’t really argue with that. After all, Herc’s fairly certain both he and Raleigh are _still_ scarred. Sure, it’d taken him at least a year to become comfortable with the idea that the Beckets were something of a package deal, but he’d become accustomed to the idea that the brothers were, well, a lot closer than any pair of brothers he’d ever met. Closer even than him and Scott, which, to be fair, wasn’t saying much some days. Regardless, Raleigh and Yancy clearly didn’t have the most _conventional_ of relationships, but it’d been nice to know that at least Raleigh was equally as upset about seeing his brother fucking Chuck into their mattress— _their bloody mattress_ ; bastards didn’t even bother to use a guest room—as Herc was by seeing his son _being_ fucked into a mattress.

Yeah. Fucking _scarred_.

“Fine,” he grits it out, although, alright, maybe he’s grinning wider than is absolutely necessary, “you can name the little menace Chuck.”

The kiss Raleigh plants on him, full of thanks as well as something else, something _hot_ , makes it worth it. Apparently, it’s going to be one of those nights where they kick the dogs (the kids, as Raleigh calls them jokingly) out of the bedroom.

It’s made completely worth it when, the next day, Raleigh, grinning conspiratorily at his brother and Herc, introduces Chuck to his new namesake. Of course, after the red faces and shouting have died down, Herc finds both Chucks curled up together on the couch while Max and Mack both crowd on either side his son’s lap. True to form, neither bulldog looks upset at the fact that such a tiny little creature has stolen Chuck’s attention from them. Fat little saints, the both of them, Herc finds himself thinking as he leans against the doorway between the living room and kitchen.

“See?” Raleigh winds an arm about Herc’s waist from behind, and he nearly jumps. Fuck, he’s getting old to not’ve heard him coming. Never mind that the little brat can be a god damned ninja when he sets his mind to it. “I told you he’d be fine with it.”

“You said no such thing,” Herc huffs softly, shivering as Raleigh breathes, laughing, against his neck.

“Whatever.” A kiss to the soft skin behind Herc’s ear, and Herc growls lowly, feels Raleigh shiver behind him.

“Unless you wanna be limping even more tomorrow than you are now, I don’t think you wanna continue that line of reasoning.”

“Mmm,” is all Herc gets in response, the vibrations travelling straight to his dick, and he’s about five seconds from mauling his husband there in the hallway, guests out front and his son right there be damned.

“Get a room, you two,” Chuck yells at them, not even looking up and making soft shushing noises when their newest arrival makes a soft sound in his lap. Raleigh laughs, unwinding himself from Herc and walking back through the kitchen towards the front. Back towards the sounds of laughter and family, where it sounds like Sasha and Aleksis—the people, not the dogs—have managed to organize a small stampede. As they tend to do when both Herc and Raleigh leave the room. 

“Pot, kettle, black, Chuck.”

“At least we _got_ a room.”

“Yeah, _our_ room.”

The exchange ends there, with Raleigh disappearing with a laugh and Chuck spluttering for a moment. Not long after, Yancy passes by Herc— _jesus_ , what the fuck’s happened to his god damned instincts?—and joins the younger Hansen in cooing at Chuck-the-dog. Fucking saps, the both of them.

Herc shakes his head, smiling to himself, and turns to follow his husband.

**Author's Note:**

> So, in case I was lame and didn't make it obvious enough (which is entirely possible), the Becket-Hansen household consists of:  
> Mako, the cat (in my head, she's an Ocicat)  
> Sasha and Aleksis, the brother and sister Pit Bulls (ascribe whatever coloration you prefer)  
> Stacker, the German Shephard  
> Yancy, the Golden Retreiver  
> Mack, the Bulldog  
> And, now, Chuck, the Dachshund  
> 


End file.
